The cake is real
by inactiveasof2016
Summary: This is a Portal AU in which Shikamaru is Chell. Portal is one of my favorite video games and it only just occurred to me that Shikamaru would play the shit out this game irl. All of GlaDOS' lines are actual lines form the game. The storyline is a bit different here for the story's sake. Hope you enjoy :)


Perhaps this was how it was always meant to be. White walls, hard floor, and one pair of orange sweatpants for the rest of his life. With no connection to the outside of this huge laboratory, broken windows from the observation rooms, and foliage completely consuming every chamber, something had happened while he was asleep for 99999 (lost track). Shikamaru was to assume that all human life was extinguished...besides him. What a drag.

Never one to socialize anyway, he almost found the situation therapeutic. Each test chamber was like a new game of shogi...without a partner waiting for your next move. Looking at his right arm and the giant device it held, Shikamaru squinted.

"Portal gun, huh?"

 _Momentum, a function of mass and velocity, is conserved between portals. In layman's terms, speedy thing goes in, speedy thing comes out._

"Who was that..?" He scanned the room for _something_ but only found a few cameras. *sigh*

The room, or rather rooms, were separated by a huge gap. In between was a long fall to an impending doom.

"So I'm supposed to put this cube on that button wayyyy the hell over there, and then the door will open to the next test?" Shikamaru looked up to where there would be a sky with endless blue and pillows of soft clouds. "Why move on if I'm never going to make it out anyway? Might as well camp out here and call it a day…" He began to lower himself onto the floor to enjoy a nap but was immediately jolted back up out of fear.

 _Please note that we have added a consequence for failure. Any contact with the chamber floor will result in an unsatisfactory mark on your official testing record, followed by death._

"Fine, sheesh." Using the unfamiliar device, he fired a bright orange shot to the other side of the chamber, where the door and button were. An orange circle as tall as he was appeared. Shooting again at the wall next to him, a blue circle appeared. Almost like a doorway, Shikamaru was able to walk through the portal to the other side of the room without falling to his death. Grabbing the small cube (which was decorated with pink hearts), he walked through, placed the cube on the button and was sent to the next test.

This is how it was for a while. Test, after test, after test. It almost drove him insane. Had he not befriended the A.I. in charge of the facility, he surely would have gone completely insane. He had been through many test up to this point, some were simple while others were laced with deadly turrets.

 _I hope you brought something stronger than a portal gun this time. Otherwise, I'm afraid you're about to become the immediate past president of the Being Alive Club. Ha, ha._

"Ha…"

GlaDOS, he found out, was her- _its_ name. After finishing tests quickly, Shikamaru was beginning to irritate GlaDOS. Before the apocalypse, finishing tests as quickly as he was _was_ unheard of. GlaDOS no longer experienced a euphoric response to Shikamaru completing a test. During the times he was permitted to sleep, he would sleep in the office in GlaDOS' chamber. She had made several attempts to kill him in his sleep. She tried closing in on him with turrets, but they were all corrupt. She tried suffocating him with neurotoxin, but nothing would happen when she tried to emit the poisonous gas. It was quite humorous to Shikamaru, actually. For he only pretended to be asleep all those times. When GlaDOS wasn't looking, he would leave the test chambers and tamper with the control rooms. He shut off the neurotoxin emitters and changed the template for proper turret production a while ago.

 _You were busy back there, weren't you?_

Shikamaru smirked and chuckled as he laid down pretending to sleep. He sat up and looked at the enormous machine, looking down at him like he was an ant.

 _Well. I suppose we could just sit in this room and glare at each other until somebody drops dead, but I have a better idea._

A few panels from the wall separated, revealing a small room with a table. Taking a closer look, Shikamaru could see a whole chocolate cake. Strawberries bordered the edges, and the questions of where the hell an A.I. acquired the ingredients to make such a pastry was ignored. He was drooling now.

 _I took the liberty of baking you a cake since it is your birthday. So Happy Birthday.*_

 _((*This is the only line that is not in the game))_

Shikamaru had acquainted well with GlaDOS. On his end, he really enjoyed her company...although it was quite possible she did not feel the same. He wasn't your average test subject, for he was just... _too smart,_ and it pissed GlaDOS off. One day, he found the main control room and enabled the elevator to the surface.

As he rose to the top, the elevator slowed and through the glass window, he saw a sea of turrets of all shapes and sizes. His heart skipped a beat as he thought his trip to freedom was halted abruptly and death was knocking on his door.

Before he could react, the turrets began singing together as an orchestra. Turrets can talk?

"...is that...Cara Mia Addio…?" Shikamaru fell on his bum on the elevator floor, releasing a sigh of relief. "I thought I was a goner."

The elevator resumed speed and was serenaded as he rose to real, warm, sunlight. Waiting at the top, a familiar companion cube waited for him. Decorated with small pink hearts.

 _It's been fun. Don't come back._


End file.
